In Heidelberg

My second day trip from Frankfurt by train was to Heidelberg, the historic city which is home of Germany's oldest university.  Heidelberg University was founded in 1386, and it remains one of the country's most reputable centers of higher education.  Because the city was not an industrial or transport center, it was not a target of Allied bombing during World War II.  Its picturesque "Altstadt" remains intact.

I entered the Old Town along Hauptstrasse (literally Main Street), a mile long pedestrian street which runs the length of the "Altstadt".

Along the Hauptstrasse is the Providenzkirche, a Lutheran church built in 1659.

Turning off of the main street, I came to one of the old university buildings.  Today it is the university museum.

Nearby is the Jesuit church which was built in the seventeenth century.

Back on the main street, I came to the old market square.  On one side is the former city hall.

Also facing the market square is one of the oldest remaining buildings in the city.  "Haus zum Ritter" (House of the Knight) was built in 1592 for a Huguenot cloth merchant.  Since 1705 it has served as a guesthouse or hotel.

At the other end of the square is the Church of Holy Ghost, a late Gothic church.

After the Reformation, a partition was built in the middle of the church, and it was shared by both Catholics and Protestants.  Today it is a Lutheran church.

A side street from the church leads to the Old Bridge, built between 1786 and 1788.  It replaced an older medieval bridge.  The gate at the bridge has been one of the entrances to the city since the Middle Ages.

The bridge offers nice views of the Neckar River, a tributary of the Rhine.

Looming over the city is Heidelberg Castle.

The castle was built as a fortress and residence for the Prince Electors of the Palatinate region of Germany.  A fortification has stood here since the 1200s, but the royal residences were built in stages through the 15th to 17th centuries.  It was one of the most important Renaissance structures north of the Alps.  However, much of it was destroyed during the Thirty Years' War and the Palatine War of Succession.

You pay admission to visit the grounds of the castle, but you are not allowed inside unless you have paid for a guided tour.  I thought that was a bit of a rip-off.  I caught a quick glimpse of an ornate chapel through an open door.

The castle at least gives you a beautiful view of the lovely city of Heidelberg.

The Rest of Cologne

I have to say that after seeing the spectacular Cathedral of Cologne everything else in the city was a bit anticlimactic.

I wandered around the "Altstadt".  As is the case with most German cities, Cologne suffered heavy damage during World War II.  Most the "old" buildings in the Old Town are reconstructions.

The medieval tower of the old "Rathaus" (City Hall) is surrounded by the modern city government building.

A row of "old" buildings with the tower of the Church of St. Martin in the background.

The Benedictine abbey church of St. Martin was begun in 1150 and completed in the mid-thirteenth century.  The spire was added in the mid-fifteenth century.  It was heavily damaged in World War II, and was not reopened until 1985.

A view of the Rhine River from the Old Town

One of Cologne's top art museums is the Wallraf-Richartz Museum which is located in the "Altstadt".  Unfortunately, the top floor, which includes their collection of Impressionists, is closed for renovation.  Only the floors with medieval art and baroque art were open.  So that was a disappointment.

Of course, the medieval art is almost entirely religious art, which is not my favorite genre.  Among the patron saints of Cologne are the Three Wise Men, so it is fitting that the collection includes this painting by an anonymous Cologne artist of the Adoration of the Magi.

Some of the paintings are frighteningly grotesque warnings of the wages of sin.  This detail of "The Last Judgement" shows the nightmarish fate of the damned.  It is interesting that among them are a number of prelates of the church.  (Is that a papal tiara worn by one of them?)

The Baroque collection included several canvasses by Peter Paul Rubens which include this bloodthirsty depiction of the myth of June and Argos.

When Argos was beheaded, Juno used his one hundred eyes to decorate the peacock's plumage.

A Rembrandt self portrait done late in his life.

I still had time before I had to catch my train back to Frankfurt, so I went to the Museum Ludwig which is next to the Cathedral and the train station.

I should have known that I would not find it that interesting since the collection is entirely modern art.  It supposedly has the third largest collection of works by Picasso in the world.  However it is certainly not a comprehensive look at his career since there is nothing from the Blue or the Rose Periods.

Weary after walking around the city all day, I returned to the train station only to find out that the train was going to be about 20 minutes late.  However, on the trip back to Frankfurt, the engineer went full speed ahead, at over 180 miles per hour.  We ended up arriving in Frankfurt on schedule. 

And Now for Schnitzel

While in Cologne I stopped for dinner at a restaurant call "Gilden im Zims" located on Hay Market Square in the Old Town.  The picturesque half timbered building is 550 years old, although the foundations date back to Roman times.  In 1920, Johann Zims acquired the building and opened a restaurant here.  In 1943 during the Allied bombing of Cologne, the Zims family took refuge in the cellar.  When the dust settled, all that was left was the facade of the building.  After the war, the family rebuilt and reopened the restaurant.

The restaurant was jammed, mostly with tourists, but I managed to find a table inside.  In spite of the crowd, the service was quick and efficient.

As a starter, I had the goulash soup, which I found rather disappointing.

However, the schnitzel with mushroom sauce was excellent.

Schnitzel, a thin cutlet of breaded meat is probably the dish most associated with Germany and Austria.  However, its origin is in the Italian city of Milan where a breaded veal cutlet known as "cotoletta a la milanese" was around since the Middle Ages.  Since northern Italy was long a part of the Hapsburg empire, the dish traveled to Vienna, where it became extremely popular.  From there the dish traveled to Germany.  (Interestingly, in Mexico a breaded cutlet is called "milanesa".)  So, we can thank the Italians for that most Germanic of dishes.

Gothic Splendor

As I mentioned in my last post, my primary reason for visiting Cologne was to see its magnificent Gothic cathedral.  The cathedral was begun in 1248, but work was halted in the 1560s due to lack of funds.  Work was resumed in the 1800s, and the cathedral was completed in 1880.  It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and with around 6 million visitors per year, it is the most visited landmark in Germany.  On Saturday, I was one of those many visitors.

The church is located next door to the train station, so as soon as I got off of the train, I went immediately to the cathedral.

The twin spires measure 515 feet in height, making the cathedral of Cologne the second tallest church in Europe.  

There are hundreds of sculptures decorating the exterior.  Some of them were not carved until the 19th century.

The beautiful stained glass windows range in age from the 15th century to the 21st century.

This altarpiece, created around 1360, is one of the earliest examples of altar building in Cologne.

This altarpiece, painted in 1445, portrays the city's patron saints.  The Three Wise Men are in the center panel paying homage to the baby Jesus.  St. Ursula is to the left and St. Gereon is to the right.

The ornately carved wooden choir stalls

The Cathedral's most famous treasure is the reliquary which supposedly holds the remains of the Three Wise Men.  Emperor Frederick Barbarossa presented the Archbishop of Cologne with the bones of the Magi.  The most celebrated goldsmith of medieval times was commissioned to create the shrine for the relics.

The cathedral of Cologne was one of the most impressive cathedrals that I have ever seen, surpassing, in my opinion, Notre Dame in Paris.